FSE

Furry search engine

formerly SoFurry search engine

Temptations of the Scales

A Someone's PC Master Tier Tale

By Dark Violet

He awoke to the sun's rays peering through the palace windows, and a gentle caress at his loins.

It was a slow awakening, gently shifting in and out of sleep, like the soft punting of a barge along a meandering river. The pressure at his crotch eased Ramesses along the pleasant ebbs, and he stretched out along the reed mat while golden, indulgent waves rolled across his mind.

What heavy fingers, and yet a delicate touch up his length. His hand slid to his crotch…

His fingers met scales.

His eyes shot open, and he threw off the thin cloth bedsheet. A snake looked back at him with big, golden eyes. It tasted the air.

The next moment, the snake was flying into the far wall and Ramesses was halfway out of bed, tugging the thin bedsheet around his naked body. It formed a squat pyramid around his erection.

"Cleo!"

He flung the curtain to his room open, white fabric flapping like a heron's wing. The slaps of his bare feet against the woven mats echoed around the sandstone walls and statues as he strode down the long, open-roofed corridor. A chattering of songbirds fluttered away from the storm that swam in his wake.

"Cleo, get out here!"

He swept the curtain to the women's wing aside, and strode right up to the dark wooden screen - two spearpoints descended from either side, stopping him from taking another step further. He didn't even deign to give the guards a glare.

"Cleo!"

There was movement behind the screen, just visible behind the mesh. A dark shape, already dressed in flowing white fabrics, was silhouetted against a far window. Two shaded blue eyes peered from within it.

"Yes, my brother?"

"Cleo, I swear to Atum himself that if I find another one of your snakes in my room, I will personally rip it in two."

"Snakes...?" Her eyelids batted, her low voice carrying a sly, self-satisfied lilt. "My dear Ramesses, I don't think you're quite well."

"You dare talk to me about wellness? I'm not the one cavorting around with the palace's menagerie on my shoulders!"

"Ramesses, please. Father told us not to fight. We should be an example for the people."

Ramesses stepped closer. The bronze spearpoints glinted in the morning sunlight that streamed in from a low window, their gleaming edges staying just shy of his neck. "If Father, blessings be, was still alive he would sooner have an assassin in your bedchambers than let you fraternise with those beasts."

"Your implications are curious, my dear Ramesses. It's an enlightening demonstration of what's in your head."

Ramesses glared at those deep sapphire pits behind the screen. He jabbed a finger toward her. "Next time… I'll be taking matters into my own hands." He swung around on one foot and stormed out of the room.

"I'm sure you will," Cleo called after him. The words had a mosquito's sting.

Cleopatra. May Anubis weigh that woman's heart, and find it the heaviest of both kingdoms! Ramesses dwelled on that face, hidden as it was, her voice betraying a deathly sweet smile.

She wanted the pharaohship. He paced back up the corridor, clutching at the sheet, staring at nothing as his mind swam in a tempest. She wanted to rip the mantle from his shoulders - or at least have a scaly tail slide it off - and there was only one way that was ever going to happen…

He tugged the curtain to his quarters aside. A handful of servants had already laid fresh sheets upon his bed, and were busying themselves with the clothes and ointments for the day's ceremonies ahead. The offending snake was nowhere to be seen; he peered at the far wall, but there was a disappointing lack of blood on the pale marble. He ordered a few of the servants to sweep his room anyway, though he knew it would be far away by now.

Pity, though. Part of him wanted to see what an example he could make of that snake. Oh, how he would indulge in it. He would hold it in his hands, caress the soft little ridges of its underbelly, ease it down and let it coil elegantly around…

…No. None of those thoughts.

As he was dressed for the coming ceremony, he forced himself to focus on his sister again, and those treasonous little plans for usurpation.

How would her little bestial assassins even accomplish her goals? Even if he was to die to some venomous serpent, and even if she got away with it, then the pharaohship would pass to Imho, their younger brother. And after him, Tuta. Four younger brothers, in all; that would mean she'd have to assassinate five pharaohs, all dead under mysterious circumstances. Hardly a plan with the cunning of Set, was it?

He couldn't make sense of it. It would have made more sense to try producing an heir; as was the case with all firstborn daughters, only those with male offspring could be the pharaoh. But ah, she had not produced one before he gained the mantle - and a well-placed edict to restrict the movements of all female royalty - and certainly no visitors - had quite effectively removed that possibility from the table, hadn't it...? No visitors, no freedom, no chance of an heir…

Yes. His place as pharaoh was secure.

The servants slipped the mantle of the Pharaoh around his shoulders, the cool metal resting against his skin. His own particular necklace jingled as it was draped across it, and the crown followed shortly afterwards, gleaming scarlet and lily in the sunlight.

His place was so secure, and yet she still arranged plans. And Cleo was not one to ignore the twisting tributaries of royal legislation - she knew the rules as well as he did. So…

The thought ate at the back of his mind, like a bug munching on a forbidden leaf.

He waved his servants away, and strode out into the broad corridor where his litter was already waiting, flanked by courtiers and palm-wavers. The procession was headed by a pair of large cats from the land across the northern sea, along with their handlers; the cats' glossy lavender fur shone in the shadows. A hubbub scattered among the drivers and the scribes, immediately becoming muted and hushed in his presence. His royal vizier came up and stammered off a page of parchment, and he dutifully ignored everything and then sent him away with a wave of the hand, still mired in the swamp of moping.

He stepped into his litter, and with barely a moment's hesitation, he was lifted up, high above the half-animal statues of their deities that lined the corridor. From somewhere behind him, a low drumbeat began to sound, and down the corridor, the great doors were unlatched and pushed open. With a reverent pace, he was taken out of the palace.

Sunlight gleamed off his white robe, scattered only by the palm fronds that danced around him. Beyond their waving green leaves, the landscape opened up into the dancing fountains and friezes of the gardens crowned by the broad palace walls, while the bustling sandy huts of the city stretched away beyond. Beyond the gardens, the great green river wound its way through the heart of the city, its banks crested with a crowd of wooden piers and wheat farms. On the horizon, surrounding the city, lay the ever-present infinity of undulating dunes. Even there, against the hazy white sky, tiny dots of dark figures and burnt umber camels already paused in reverence of his presence.

The parade left the palace gates, and set off down the obelisk-flanked processional way towards the Temple of the Kings, already a sandy chisel-shaped wedge that rose from the temple district. It was the Ceremony of the Ancestors today; a crudely amusing coincidence, what with Cleo's foul invoking of their father's name still on his mind. Still, he would have plenty of time to reflect later; he could ruminate on his sister's plans another time.

Her, and the snakes at her beck and call…

***

The crowd that formed around the precession towards the Temple of the Kings was slightly larger than average, and a smile broke through his mood as it swelled. Rippling songs and pleads for intercession washed over him as he was carried between the twin sphinxes that guarded the Temple's courtyard, and the procession came to a halt by the staircase that led up into the stone arch itself.

He stepped down from his litter to the incantations of the priests, and stepped up to the archway at the head of the temple. Voices rose and trembled in songs he barely cared to pay attention to. He didn't face the crowds - this was not a ceremony for them. His role was to head inside the temple, and descend to the first step of the afterlife, disappearing from this plane. Transported to the land of the dead, he was to commune with the spirits of his ancestors and to accept their wisdom and guidance.

And it would be a welcome break from the oppressive desert heat and the constant attention of servants and politics. No meddling sister would interrupt such a pleasant few hours, either.

Thin white incense rolled around him, its smoky, spicy taste making his eyelids flutter. The incantations of the priests rose around him, their tremulous words calling up the gods beyond this world. At the right moment, water tipped onto the incense, sending up a great sheet of white smoke - and he stepped through it, beneath the temple arch and into the narrow passage beyond. Time to shake his mortal body, and step for a moment into the afterlife...

The passage ended after only a few steps, and he came to a stop in front of a masoned stone wall. He tilted his head to the side, peering back towards the entrance through the corner of his eye - the white smoke of incense was so thick he could only just see the faint outlines of the priests beyond it.

That would do.

He crouched, and pulled at a hidden fingerhold at the edge of one of the stones. It swung out, the stone itself far shallower than one may think, into a tight passage just wide enough for him to crawl into. He tucked his feet into it, slipped inside, and pulled the stone closed behind him.

In a moment, the smoke would clear, and his people would gaze upon the empty passageway where the pharaoh had been. What else would they assume, but the spiritual?

As he worked his way down the narrow passage, Ramesses smiled to himself at the thought, at the memory of his regent teaching him of his duty before his coronation, at the smirk that pulled at the corner of his mouth. A showman's trick, like the entertainers that travelled up and down the river to perform at the marketplaces. Some may say that there had been nothing spiritual in the slightest. Oh, and yet who but the Gods could arrange such a performance?

Ramesses shimmied out of the passage, his sandalled feet and flowing robes meeting the cool air of the nigh-dark inner sanctum. He sat up - a row of thin, blocky shafts in the ceiling let in a few beams of sunlight, which barely illuminated the edges of the room, showing the outlines of statues hanging over him.

He found a pair of knapping stones near his feet, and with them he lit a small torch sitting in a holder by the passage exit. It took him a few tries, and a few curses of his ancestor's names, before the sparks managed to catch, and the oil-soaked fabric blossomed into life.

He took the torch, lighting the series of oil lamps around the edge of the room, casting shadows on the statues. Stone faces, with long, regal beards and pointed, bird-like eyes, stared back at him impassively in the orange light. There was his great-grandfather, Mithridates. And his great uncle, Arsinoe. His father, Ptolemy...

An empty plinth, next to his father. He didn't let his gaze rest on it.

He placed the torch back into its holder and knelt down on the cool stone floor before the statues. He brought up his hands to his chest, fingers resting on the soft cotton of his robe, and let his eyes fall closed.

For a moment there was the distant hiss of settling dust, and then there was quiet, the only sound the rising and falling of his breath, and the fluttering of the low flames from the lamps.

Thoughts flickered in his mind. The rumours of war in the north, the ever-present nomads from the great dune sea, the face of Cleo peering from behind the screen... one by one, he calmed them, letting them rise up, crest, and then drift away like thin smoke. His heartbeat slowed, his breath soft, until it was just him; patient, open, waiting in the presence of his ancestors.

The air rested upon his hands, tiny twitches in the air currents sending tingles across his fingers. It was coming now - yes, there it was. The spirits of old were reaching out, the comfort of their presence moving to embrace him-

"Yaaah!"

He jerked his leg to one side. Pain blossomed across his ankle! He rolled away, grabbing the torch again, and swung it across the ground. Something moved - he lunged, snatching it up with one hand.

He lifted the snake up in front of his eyes. Its fangs were slick with a red sheen.

"You spawn of darkness!"

His heart was thumping, his blood like hot milk in his leg. That unsettling warmth was already spreading. He gritted his teeth as the pain followed in its path, glowering at the snake writhing in his grip.

With his other hand, he yanked at his necklace, snapping it away from his neck. He shoved one of the pendants to his lips, and bit at the end - the wax seal gave, and bitter-tasting liquid dribbled out onto his tongue.

He managed to swallow it all before he coughed, dropping the pendant and half-collapsing to the ground. He retched a few times, the taste clinging to the back of his tongue - but already his breathing was getting easier, and the pain was fizzling out, like hot sand trickling away through his fingers.

He brought the snake back up to his face, staring into the golden slits of its eyes.

"Really... Cleo? In the... temple of our fathers?" His breath came in heavy, grateful gulps. He relaxed back, stretching his wounded leg out in front of him. It felt like a thousand bees were bouncing around it.

The snake lashed its tail, hissing, its small tongue gleaming in the torch's light. Already though, its movements were slowing. Did it know it had failed?

Oh, but what a clever plan, though! Where better to dispose of his body but inside here, where only pharaohs are allowed to tread? When he wouldn't reappear at the ceremony's end, it might be said the underworld had kept him. A purely spiritual matter. No suspicion...

"But you thought I would have no antivenom, would you?" he said, grabbing the pendant and dangling the now-empty vial in front of the snake's face. "Poor you."

Another hiss. It reared its head, staring at him with an air of serpentine defiance.

He leaned back, lifting the snake up. "Now how to repay the favour...?" he wondered aloud. He could rile the serpent up, then turn it loose in the women's quarters... ah, perhaps not, it would probably just return to her. Cook it and serve it to her as dinner? That had a certain appeal, he admitted...

He turned the snake over in his hand while he thought, the sensation of victory buoying the motions. It was one of his sister's smaller ones, not even as long as his arm. Its scales gleamed in the firelight - golden, like the rest of the Palace's serpents, instead of the pedestrian purple ones that slithered around the dunes and commoner's houses, or even the shining green ones spoke of in tales, hiding deep in the delta of the great river. But still, it was hardly one of her more dangerous specimens. Perhaps it needed to be small to get in here?

He lifted the rest of its body in his other hand, keeping the head far from any exposed skin. He let his gaze drift along the small, soft scales of the underbelly, the way they were flatter than the rest, save for a slight bulge near the tip of the tail...

He paused, staring at it.

But no, no, none of those thoughts, he reminded himself, lowering the snake's tail again.

No. No, for he may be found out, and even if he wouldn't then he would know, and remember every moment, and…

Then again...

He lifted it back up, inspecting the barely-visible slit once more. Cleo's snakes had been tormenting him for months. In his bath at first, in his robes, and now lately in his bed. Of course, he'd refused to fall to the same whims that so obviously gripped Cleo, but...

A long-suppressed flame in his mind sparked once more, whispered temptations slipping through, colouring those memories. The bath, for instance - the snake had almost encircled his waist before he had seen it. The robes - hadn't it nestled in his undergarments? He'd even wondered at the time about defanging it and trapping it there. And this morning, in the bed, the way that snake had curled just so - tantalisingly so - around his crotch...

He leaned forwards - the buzzing in his leg had all but subsided, and he knelt down before the statues, holding the snake in front of him with one hand. It seemed almost to smile at him as he pulled his robe aside and unwrapped his undergarments.

His shaft was already half-erect as he touched it to the snake's underside. Cool scales against his head… he shuddered. The serpent twitched, but didn't try to move away - was that a smirk on its face, or was he merely imagining it? Ah... which way would be more fun...?

He pressed the blunt tip of his shaft against the snake's slit. Warmth rippled from within the serpent. Pre beaded at his tip, glinting in the firelight, and he smeared it over the scales, edging the slight lips of flesh aside. His shaft was hardening, growing, by the moment - baser instincts and promises taking over his mind.

With his free hand, he encircled the snake and his shaft, his fingers and thumb just managing to brush each other when he squeezed. It was going to be a tight fit - the snake itself wasn't much wider than his length. The thought made his shaft jump, dribbling more pre out against the slit.

And yet, Rammesses paused, merely grinding against those scales. His heart teetered, feeling suddenly a little heavier. After all, he had tried to avoid these thoughts for so long. Why give in now...?

But then Cleo's half-hidden face drifted through his mind, and his loins burned in fury.

He was going to show her what he thought of her little creatures.

His tip strained at the entrance, but he wasn't going to give in. All it needed was some encouragement, some spreading of those soft scales with his thumb, and then pressing down, pressing firmer now, not letting up, until the soft lips slipped around the head and...

"Ahhhhh~!"

A shudder ran though his body, up through his legs and not stopping until it reached the tips of his fingers. By Ra above... he was doing it. He was finally doing it, after so long!

And it was so warm inside, so strangely warm compared to the cold scales. And while it was tight on the tip of his shaft, so much so that he would be forced out if his own grip wasn't so absolute - to say it was unpleasant would be far from the truth. Certainly, this was nothing like what a human woman had ever given him.

And the snake… the snake didn't seem to want to stop him. It just watched, its small tail coiling just beneath his shaft, peering at him with that defiant golden gaze

He curled his fingers around the snake's body, and slowly dragged it down. It hissed softly, almost enticingly - he suddenly got the idea of it luring him in, and he gripped tighter around its neck with his other hand, its movements impotent without that reach, just in case.

Bit by bit, he worked his shaft deeper inside it. Already the snake's little body was bulging - he lifted his thumb, smiled broadly at the sight of the underside of the snake stretched into the familiar shape of the head of his shaft. His legs tingled again, and he sat back onto his ankles, lifting the top half of the snake into the air, while he took the snake's tail with his other hand. It coiled around his thumb, rattle rapping at his knuckles.

What an... incredible little thing! He gritted his teeth as he eased it back up, then down his shaft again. His length shone with the snake's juices, clear and shining and inviting. He pushed harder, that slit already distorted far past its design, distending and gripping like a vice around his cock - but still wet, still malleable, and still gripping so wonderfully he had no fear of slipping out...

Oh, fuck, he couldn't go so slowly! He growled, wrapping his fist around the bulge he was making in the snake's body, and began to fuck the snake; he jolted it up and down with quick, indulgent motions. For a moment, he didn't even recognise his own groaning gasps echoing around the chamber. He'd never made such noises before!

And the snake… hisses pistoned out of it with each bounce. Its body curled around his hand, pressed in, almost holding on to stay in place. Ahhh… maybe…

Maybe these palace snakes really could be more than pests…

He curled his body over the snake, squeezing the bulge tighter as he continued to jerk himself off with the snake's body, each thrust working his shaft deeper inside the little serpent, finding that warm, tight, inviting flesh waiting for him. He gasped out a laugh as the idea of Cleo's face crossed his mind - the dour glare that she would give if she knew what he was doing to one of her little pets. His hands moved faster - he lifted its head up so that it could see the bulge he was making in its own belly. Its tail twitched, coiling around the base of his shaft now, rattling against his balls, and with that he suddenly realised his urge to hilt himself completely inside it. Oh, what a sight he needed to see...!

He couldn't last much longer - he had to do it soon. He knelt up, planting his knees firmly on the sandy ground, and jolted the body up and down his shaft. That slick wetness coated his member a bit more, a bit further down each time - and his fingers tingled as he got closer and closer, aching now to feel that sweet kiss of the slit against the base of his shaft...

He managed it, even as the climax loomed, like standing on the crest of a great sand dune before the azure northern sea; the soft, cool scales pressing like a tight pair of lips around the base of his shaft. His balls pressed up against the twitching tail, and he half-fell to one side with a ripple of pleasure - the first sweet breeze that preceded an orgasm. He gripped at the slit itself and ground up against it, pre and serpentine liquids making tiny bubbles at the indescribably tight seal. He was teetering now, just on the edge, ah-ha, almost…

The snake stared up at him still, hissing once more, lips parted and wide, but its motions were weaker, almost perfunctory. The mists of orgasm hung over the plains of his mind, just shy of touching the sands. He panted, staring down at the snake's body so tightly shaped around his shaft, not yet over the edge but feeling it just on the horizon. He let go with the hand around the slit, and then slowly stroked one finger up the bulging scales, thin and almost translucent with the stretching...

"Ahhh... ahhh-hhaaaahhhh~!"

The climax was like being thrown into a hot river on a cold winter night. He had to fight from collapsing as stars and sunbeams flared in his vision. He let go of the bulge, his hand going to the ground just before he fell over. The snake twitched from side to side - and for a moment it was within striking distance of his chest, but he pulled it away before it could strike. Through bleary eyes he stared at the snake, watched the bulge throb in time with his heartbeat, spurt after spurt of seed trickling deep into the spoils of his victory.

He must have lain there for a while, holding the snake away from him, not letting a single drop escape. His shaft, too, refused to go down - his feet tingled as he looked down at the little creature, tail rattling again as it patted against his balls.

He took great pleasure in watching as how that long body stretched as he pulled the spent snake off his cock; its grip was still so tight, leaving a sheen of its own juices, and not a hint of his own white seed. With a final shhhhlip, the lips slid off the head and relaxed, gently closing after his indulgence.

He let go of the neck, and staggered to his feet. The snake rolled onto its front, and almost as if in a drunken stupor, it began to slither back into the shadows, leaving a thin trail of sparkling drops in its path.

Oh… if he had as much an effect on it as it had on him… yes, yes, there was more here, more to enjoy. More to plot…

Ramesses sat down heavily onto the empty plinth beside his father's statue, and leaned back, taking in great gulps of breath. His cock twitched between his legs, still mostly hard. Part of him wanted to drag the snake back for round two, but...

No. No, he'd done enough for now...

As the glow began to fade, and energy returned to his tingling limbs, he found his smugness turning to more calculating matters. He leaned back, steepling his fingers, and stared up at the dark reaches of the temple's roof.

Would Cleo know, perhaps, what he had done?

In a way - sordid and vengeful - he rather hoped she would.

The thought was just one more reason that a smile could not be robbed from his face.

***

It was late afternoon by the time her snake returned through the window in the women's quarters, and the clamour of the ceremony outside was back into full swing. Cleopatra lounged back on the couch, the feather cushions supporting her weight as she draped a lazy hand to the floor. She narrowed her eyes as it jerked its way over to her - the poor thing seemed to be having an awful time of it...

As it coiled itself around her arm, it lifted its head, tasting the air. It blinked in that wonderful sideways blink of a serpent. It wore that ever-defiant smile.

She brushed its head with one finger, muttering to it in the snaketongue. It leaned into the tiny scratches, closing its eyes as she rubbed just behind the jawbone. Its tail began to rattle appreciatively. Her finger slipped lower, running over the snake's body, the graceful curves...

Its belly was bulging, ever so slightly. Below the belly, in fact - right there, yes. Her fingertips probed the soft scales...

"So all has gone well, then," she said, and she matched the snake's serene smile.

The snake opened its eyes, glancing back along its body, tasting the air again.

Cleopatra lifted herself to her feet, and stepped slowly towards the window, gazing out at the sandy city beyond. Buildings and huts, in their countless shades of white and yellow, clustered around the great river; it was vibrant this season, as green as it had ever been, and for a moment Cleopatra wondered how her hand could shape it, too, in time - the way that all water shapes the land, if it's patient enough.

The snake was already slipping down her body, always coiling around her soft, bronzed skin. She took its tail, and eased it beneath the folds of her garments. Soft scales met smooth skin, and slit kissed slit.

She continued to indulge in the view as she began to stroke, coaxing out what lay in the snake's little body. Her movements slowed as she fought to keep her hands from trembling, tingling in utter delight. Warm drops were eased between her own waiting lips…

The months of planning, the years of waiting - they would bear fruit before the year was out.

A firstborn daughter must produce a male heir if they were to be pharaoh. Bloodlines, and all that. Delightfully devious of Ramesses to keep her locked away then, no? But... why should he have all the fun?

Already, her brother's seed - kept warm and fertile by the snake's body - was slipping inside her; the almost-imperceptible sounds, wet drips and squeezed scales, were lost in the sighing of the breeze, the empty triumph of the ceremony's celebrations, and the tantalising commotion of the city - of the empire - that stretched out before her.

The End